


The Road Less Travelled By

by sir_coriander_cadaverish



Category: Nimona (Webcomic)
Genre: Everything is Fine AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-26
Updated: 2020-10-26
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:20:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27205138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sir_coriander_cadaverish/pseuds/sir_coriander_cadaverish
Summary: I've been so excited to publish this bad boy and the time has finally come!! aaahh!!!!!! We all love the Everything Is Fine AU, where the boys run away together to live in the woods after the kingdom is overthrown - so here's my multi-chapter EIFAU fic!!!!!!! Enjoy :))
Relationships: Ballister Blackheart/Ambrosius Goldenloin
Comments: 1
Kudos: 3





	1. Miles to Go

**Author's Note:**

> sorry that it kinda drops you right in but I HATE EXPOSITION so you'll have to bear with me lol (also it's told from Blackheart's perspective hehe)

The woods are always far larger than they seem on the outside. But we'd begun, and there would be no turning back.

"So I've been reading a lot of Robert Frost lately," Ambrosius told me when we'd began our journey on the first day. I raised an eyebrow. "You've been reading?" He gave me a playful shove; I stumbled over, snickering. "Yes, I've been reading," he huffed with a toss of his hair. "I've got _some_ free time, y'know." "No wonder I was able to take down the Institution so easily," I mused. "Anyway, one of his quotes really stuck with me," he continued. "It said, 'These woods are lovely, dark and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep.' Pretty relevant, huh?" I nodded. "Yeah. But what are _our_ promises to keep?" He bit his lip thoughtfully. "I guess the promise to keep going? And not turn back," he decided. I agreed. "This journey's gotta mean something, I suppose. Which reminds me of _my_ favorite Robert Frost quote," I added. He turned to look at me, intrigued. "Oh, yeah? Which one?" I gazed up at the looming trees overhead. "'The only way round... is through.'"

\---

"Wait," Ambrosius said, interrupting the long silence as we trekked on through the woods. "What if one of us has to use the bathroom?" I gave him a meaningful look, then nodded toward the trees around us. To my amusement, he made a series of disgusted faces, each reflecting the five stages of grief. "No," he whispered, disbelieving. I stared onward, nodding grimly. "Yep." He slowly turned his gaze back onto the ground before us, still absorbing the thought. "...Well, that's horribly undignified," he remarked at last. I suppressed a smile; even in his disgust, he was endearing. "Well, we don't have much of a choice, I'm afraid."

\---

We were walking down this broad path when Ambrosius suddenly froze. In a flash, he let go of my hand and took off into the forest, running down the overgrown slope. "What's up?" I called after him. "Come on!" he shouted simply over his shoulder. I felt a smile creep onto my face and ran after him.

When I finally caught up with him, he was standing behind a giant, mossy rock that stood in the middle of a clearing. I watched in surprise as he led out from behind the rock one beautiful gray horse, tossing its silvery mane in the sunlight, clearly delighted to see Ambrosius. "Good boy, Murdock," he was cooing happily to the horse, "Did you miss me?" The horse whinnied and nuzzled Ambrosius affectionately, who laughed out loud. The two seemed like lifelong friends. Suddenly, Ambrosius saw me standing off to the side and ran up to me, throwing his arms around my neck and twirling around. "Isn't this awesome?" he cried gleefully, "Now we have transportation!" I nodded, still awestruck. "How did your horse... get all the way out here?" He shrugged. "I guess it's just a stroke of luck." He turned back to Murdock and hugged the horse's massive head. "Y'hear that, boy? You're our lucky horse!" Murdock whinnied again, perhaps in agreement. "Wow," I said finally, "You're right... that is awesome."


	2. Two Roads Diverged

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you liked that first chapter!! this is probably my largest fic ever lol

By the third day, however, I could tell that something was troubling Ambrosius. He didn't say anything out of the ordinary, but he seemed to buzz with nervous tension. Not jittery, but more like a heavy sense of concern. My hunch was confirmed later that night, when we were laying together in our makeshift shelter. It was quiet - too quiet, I decided. As always, Ambrosius slept in my arms, but something told me that he wasn't asleep at all that night. His breaths were too shallow, his stillness too acute and performative. Suddenly, he shifted beneath my arm and rolled all the way around to face me. Just as I'd thought, he'd been wide awake all along. Gradually, I felt his arms slip around my midsection and hold me, rather tightly, close against him. As wonderful as that felt, it was clear now that something was bothering him; the way he hugged me like he feared I might evaporate at any moment. With his face buried in my chest, I heard him take a shaky breath.

"You okay?" I finally whispered to him, almost inaudibly. When he nodded, I felt his silky hair graze my chin. "...Yeah." I didn't push it further, instead choosing to run my fingers gently through his hair for a while; that always used to help him fall asleep when we were kids. Funny that I still remember that, I thought to myself. When I finally wrapped my arms around him, I could feel his worry emanating through his body. And, as I began to feel myself drift off, I wondered what could be wrong.

\---

In the morning, I woke to thick beams of sunlight streaming through the twigs of our shelter's roof. I hadn't realized how scraggly it had been last night; had it rained, we would've been soaked through. I turned to point this out to Ambrosius and was surprised to find the blanket beside me to be... empty. He was already outside and packing up, I noted; such an early rise was certainly unusual for him. When I stepped outside, blinking in the cool brightness of morning, he offered me a tight-lipped smile. I smiled back and started to help him clean. Within the hour, we were back on the road.

\---

Ambrosius wouldn't voice his concerns until that evening. We were sitting beside our scrawny campfire and eating whatever measly meal could be made from our diminishing wares when, finally, Ambrosius spoke. "Y'know, I was thinking," he said with the hesitant tone of someone who'd been doing a substantial amount of thinking, "...How long can we last like this?"

I raised an eyebrow. "'Like this?'" Ambrosius waved vaguely at the whole scene - our crooked little shelter, our weak and spluttering fire, our tired horse, our sad dinner - and his voice edged with impatience. "Yes, like this. We're running out of food, honey... and we've got to find better shelter, now that it's getting cold. Even Murdock's getting sick of all this aimless roaming around." 

I gave him a look. "Well, let's remember that this wasn't exactly my idea, now was it." I watched him flush, growing indignant. "Well, what are you suggesting? We just give up? Head back for the kingdom?" "You know that's not what I'm saying," I replied, running out of patience, "I'm just saying we don't have a choice here. We can't turn back, so we just have to keep moving forward." Ambrosius threw his hands up in the air and cried, "With what food? With whose materials?! Look at us - we're practically running on empty!" Glaring at him, I retorted, "Maybe if you'd bothered to take a bit more from your bottomless hoard of Institution wealth, we'd have more food to speak of!" It was quiet after that. A tense silence, save for the rush of a distant river. Then, Ambrosius shook his head and took a deep breath. "Look," he said in a calmer voice, "Let's not fight." He glanced at me, silently pleading for agreement. I sighed, already deflating. "You're right," I admitted, "That's not fixing anything." He nodded with a little smile, then turned back to me. "...We'll be okay, right?" _How should I know?_ I felt the familiar urge to reassure him, though. "Sure we will," I said with a shrug. "We'll figure it out." He seemed to appreciate the answer, whether or not he really believed it. After a long and thoughtful pause, he glanced at me affectionately and added, "I love you, Lord Blackheart." I smiled despite myself; he had that sort of power over me. "And I love you, Sir Goldenloin," I replied sincerely. We both chuckled. He might've played it cool, but I could see his inner glow return to him.


	3. A Predestined Destination

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a lil baby chapter but fear not! a big one's a-comin'

"Right, now that that's out of the way," he said cheerfully, "We need to figure out shelter, first and foremost." I nodded slowly. "I agree," I said simply. "But I don't really know where we can go at this point." I mulled over one thought for a moment before murmuring, "I mean, the only place where we could even hypothetically stay is-" "Hold on," Ambrosius said, suddenly coming to a realization. I immediately knew what he was going to say; the same thing I was thinking. His eyes sparkled in the flickering firelight. Remarkably, we said it at the same time.  
"Do you remember that cabin from Institution Day?"

\---

It was one of the most important days of the year at the Institution: the day for new recruits to get oriented and take part in numerous wholesome activities and lukewarm games across the sprawling campus, while we - the seasoned veteran students of the school - essentially got to screw around unsupervised for an entire day. That year, Ambrosius and I were 8th years - we had thirteen years to our names, and all the brash confidence to go with it. So, we and a handful of unruly young teens much like ourselves decided to go on an adventure all the way out to the Far Forest. In retrospect, nothing terribly exciting resulted from the excursion - and the trip got cut short when Ambrosius tripped and skinned both his knees so badly that his shins were soon streaked with blood, which I can imagine was quite painful (not that he'd have ever admitted it) - but we did happen to encounter a large and totally abandoned cabin, standing grandly near the cliff that overlooks the whole kingdom. We could see everything from that cliff - the Institution, the marketplace, the bank and the arena, and the distant mountains looming over it all. I could even see my father's house from that cliff, which I chose not to mention to the others. Anyway, we left soon afterward, closely monitoring a limping Ambrosius, who loudly protested against any attempts to carry him, and I can imagine that most everyone forgot about that cabin not long after. But still, over all these years, I've always imagined that cabin still standing, out there in the middle of nowhere, waiting for the right people to call it home.

**Author's Note:**

> this one yall. THIS ONE. i'm so excited omg anyways hope ur enjoying my forest fic!! pls tell me if u like it :')))))


End file.
